1. Dr. Gene D’Amour Senior Vice President for Resource Development Xavier University of Louisiana July 30, 2013

2.  Funding to connect Xavier to LONI and strengthen collaborative computational research and educational opportunities for Xavier students and faculty  ∽$1.2 million in ARRA funding  ∽$674,000 to BoR for fiber;  ∽$500,000 to Xavier for education, training, and research

3. Enhance Research Competitiveness Facilitate collaborative research in Materials Science Facilitate collaborative research in Computational Science Advance curricula in Computer Science, Engineering and Materials Science to engage minority students Engage minority undergraduates in Computational Science research projects Advance training and workforce development

4.  Project Execution Team communicated regularly to discuss the progress of the grant  September 20, 2012: All Hands Meeting ◦ 21 attendees ◦ Presentations by LONI staff, pilot project PIs, undergraduate research students, LONI/LSU training staff

5.  Xavier is now fully connected to LONI  Connection doubled bandwidth at the University from 250 MB to 500 MB ◦ Faculty and staff network increased from 150 MB to 200 MB ◦ Student network increased from 100 MB to 300MB ◦ Faculty/students can conduct research via LONI at a speed of 10GB

6. Speakers at the ceremony included: ◦ Dr. Norman Francis, President, Xavier University ◦ Melva Williams, Vice President for Technology Administration, Xavier University ◦ Donnie Vandal, Executive Director, LONI Board of Trustees’ Ribbon Cutting Ceremony: June 7, 2013

7. Collaborative Computational Research at Xavier  Computational Materials Science Research – in conjunction with RII Track 1 (Lamar Meda, Vladimir Kolesnichenko, Galina Goloverda, Kevin Riley)  5 publications / 5 presentations

8. Bioinformatics (Andrea Edwards and Karen Zhang)  Awarded $463K DoD Data Mining Grant  Bioinformatics core proposed in RCMI renewal grant  6 journal publications, 1 book chapter, 3 presentations

9. Mathematics Research  Dominic Marcello (LSU Postdoc) working with Valerio DeAngelis (Xavier Math Faculty) to use LONI for research  Chapter published in Numbers and Functions by Victor Moll

10. Pilot Projects for Collaborative Computational Research 3 projects awarded at∽34K each: ◦ Lamar Meda (Xavier) and Ramu Ramachandran / Collin Wick (LaTech) ◦ Jian Zhang (Xavier) and Guang-Lin Zhao (SUBR) ◦ Jessica Graber (Xavier) and Lev Kaplan (Tulane)

11. Synthesis and Characterization of Nanostructure Ruthenium ◦ Lamar Meda (Xavier faculty) ◦ Ramu Ramachandran (LaTech faculty) ◦ Collin Wick (LaTech faculty) ◦ Geoffrey Stevens (Xavier undergraduate) Objective: Use chemical vapor deposition to grow ruthenium oxide nanomaterials as a possible electrode material for lithium-ion batteries

12. 7 presentations including 1 student presentation

13. A Study of Gas-Sensing Properties of Tin Oxide Nanoparticles ◦ Jian Zhang (Xavier faculty) ◦ Guang-Lin Zhao (SUBR faculty) ◦ Mark Raymond (Xavier undergraduate) ◦ Nicole Patterson (Xavier undergraduate) Objective: Develop a nanostructured tin oxide system and seek a theoretical description of the gas sensing properties for such a system through large scale nanomaterial simulation

14. Student presentation at Xavier Festival of Scholars

15. The Interaction of Linear and Nonlinear Effects in Freak Wave Formation ◦ Jessica Graber (Xavier faculty) ◦ Lev Kaplan (Tulane faculty) ◦ Kedric Hayes (Xavier undergraduate) ◦ Justin Cutrer (Xavier undergraduate) ◦ Jhamal Davis (Xavier undergraduate)  Objective: to familiarize students with the programs used to model wave formation in the deep ocean  Student presentation at Southeastern Region American Physical Society conference

16.  $20,000 start-up package provided to new Computational Chemistry faculty member, Kevin Riley  Used for purchase of computers and software including Pymol, Yasara, Gaussian, and Molpro  Working with 7 undergraduate researchers  3 journal publications

17. 37 undergraduate student researchers supported in the last year  Computer Science  Chemistry  Physics

18. Three New Computer Science Courses  Robotics and Intelligent Systems (offered as Mobile Devices in Spring 2012)  Bioinformatics Programming (developed Summer 2012, to be offered Spring 2014)  Data Mining (developed Summer 2011, to be offered Spring 2015) Additional data-intensive courses to be offered Fall 2014: Scientific Computing and Data Analysis

19. New computational content formulated for:  Existing courses (computational content to be added Fall 2013) ◦ Introduction to Engineering ◦ Introduction to Engineering Design ◦ Engineering Graphics  New courses (to be offered Fall 2013) ◦ Fundamentals of Materials Science, 3000-level ◦ Advanced Materials Synthesis, 4000-level

20.  November 2012: 6 undergraduate computer science students attended the SC12 Supercomputing Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah  Participated in an international programming competition

21. January 2013: LSU-led HPC workshop hosted at Xavier  20+ students attended and learned about upcoming research and training opportunities  Alexandria Robinson (Xavier student) – one of 40 students chosen to participate in national XSEDE Scholars Program in Summer 2013

22. February 2013: 15 Computer Science students toured the LSU Computing Services mainframe room ◦ Saw first-hand HPC hardware ◦ Discussed networking LONI servers ◦ Discussed HPC networks including Google’s search engine

23. March 2013: Dr. William A. Lester, Professor of Graduate School and Theoretical/Physical Chemistry at UC-Berkeley, visited Xavier and spoke with students about: ◦ His academic history ◦ Ways he uses computation in his research ◦ Importance of computation to his research ◦ Success in grad school

24. June 12-13, 2013 (Baton Rouge, LA): Xavier jointly hosted the 2nd Annual High Performance Computing User Symposium, with Louisiana State University  Symposium consisted of invited talks and a poster session discussing research using HPC systems  Excellent opportunity for the LONI user community to come together and share experiences and methods and for Xavier faculty to learn more about HPC research in the State

25.  1 full-time position (Grant Coordinator)  1 postdoctoral associate  42 undergraduate students  Equivalent to 2.5 full-time employees (fiber construction)

26.  External Evaluator – Cindi Dunn, Kansas State University  Internal Evaluator – Melanie Steen Sighinolfi  Conducted focus groups with undergraduate students, faculty, and management team (April – July 2013)  Currently awaiting final evaluation report

27. MetricGoalActual Proposals1010 submitted ‡ 4 funded ‡‡ Publications1518 Presentations1520 Courses with HPC content added55 Minority students attending courses100%7 Faculty & students attending HPC training activities2550 Minority students engaged in research1042 Student presentations105 Student publications50 Student graduation rate100%8 students have graduated Minorities entering grad school in STEM fields60%4 (50% of graduates) Minority graduates entering workforce in STEM fields 40%4 (50% of graduates) Patent disclosures and licenses20 Number of jobs created2546.5 ‡ 4 Pilot, 2 DoD, 2 NSF,1 BoR, 1 LBRN ‡‡ (3 Pilot, 1 DoD)